"Hothouse Age" takes us into the world of the 21st century - with its disasters, its utopias, and the first steps into the solar system. The new century will bring much hardship to mankind: climatic changes, desertification, pollution, a widening gap between favoured and disfavoured regions, depletion of resources, regional wars. Despite gentech, artificial intelligence, exploration and exploitation of the solar system, especially the asteroid belt, the desintegration and partial breakdown of human civilization is imminent. Taken together, the stories of this collection form the beginning of a large future history - the Steinmueller Universe - and pave the road which ultimately leads to Andymon, Pulaster and Spera.